Category technology

Jul 17 2013

If North Korea and Cuba have been trading arms…

North Korean Missiles aboard the DPRK Ship Chong Chon Gang. (Courtesy of Yahoo)

North Korean Missiles aboard the DPRK Ship Chong Chon Gang. (Courtesy of Yahoo)

…could this lead to a new Cuban Missile Crisis?

Panama found a North Korean vessel with several missiles (stated to be “outdated”) in its hold bound from Cuba back to the Juche-state that is banned from importing almost any type of weapon by sanction.

The Cuban government, in a televised statement, stated they were headed to North Korea for “repair” and return back to the communist state.

Let’s leave the “repair” aspect of this alone — and assume for a moment, that that’s true.  This means that North Korea and Cuba could very  well have been doing this for awhile, freely — with nobody’s knowledge.

Imagine another Cuban Missile Crisis, with arms once again aimed at the United States by a nation less than 100 miles away from the US Coastline.  Except this time, the arms and the figurative “button” are now in the hands of authoritarian North Korea — and a government hell-bent on proving a point to it’s people that it can, indeed “rain holy fire” down on the nation that the Juche and Songun state has made out to be it’s blood-enemy.

chong-chon-gang

DPRK Ship Chong Chon Gang

Could this be a flue warning sign of something that could come in the future?  Could this have also blown open a cover of how North Korea’s been getting stuff?

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Jun 21 2013

Trans-Pacific Partnership — what’s the deal?

Seal of the Office of the United States Trade ...I’m deeply disturbed by something Senator Elizabeth Warren has brought to the floor of Congress just recently.

The US Trade Representative is currently conducting negotiations on renewing a trade agreement with several allied nations, called the “Trans-Pacific Partnership.”  Historically, and even under the Bush Administration, this had Congressional oversight.  Apparently, under the Obama Administration — the Administration who’s buzzword is ‘Transparency,” that’s no longer the case.

The US Trade Representative is REFUSING Congressional requests for review — in any capacity, including “scrubbed” versions, with individual country names redacted, but the policy proposals visible.

Why would a treaty involving commerce, and indeed, including representatives from companies like Bank of America, Comcast, TimeWarner, be so secretive?

Indeed, the only Representative in Congress who’s SEEN the agreement, has said the following:

Florida congressman Alan Grayson.

“There is no national security purpose in keeping this text secret.”
 — Represenative Alan Grayson (D-FL)

Repeatedly asked for the text that Senator Warren refers to, she, and Congress, have been categorically DENIED.  Why is the US Trade Representative not allowing for either a) Public transparency or b) Congressional transparency when the only member of Congress YET to review it, says there is no concern for National Security?

“…’transparency would undermine the Trade Representative’s policy to complete the trade agreement, because Public Opposition would be significant.’   In other words, if the Public knew what was going on, they would STOP it.”
 — Senator Elizabeth Warren, quoting the US Trade Representative

“If transparency would lead to widespread public opposition to a trade agreement, then that trade agreement should not be the policy of the United States.”
— Senator Elizabeth Warren

See her speech to Congress here.

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Jun 3 2013

“Are you out there?” Maybe — but not so fast…

Image

An Asgard, from Stargate SG-1

We’ve transmitted friendship messages, we’ve sent satellites, we’ve scanned the heavens… but we’ve found no clues as to ET or Supreme Commander Thor’s wearabouts yet.  Or have we?

Think of the Internet.  When we send an email, we click “Send” and the email is broken apart into bits and bytes, going through several [if not dozens of] separate servers and paths all over the internet, until it finally arrives at the server address you designated, where it’s reassembled, and readable to the receiver.

Now, to you and me, that’s no news.  No news at all whatsoever.  But imagine intercepting just one piece of this email.  It’s broken apart from the other parts of it; and because it is, it makes no sense to anyone.  You know something is here — but what?

That could be how an advanced alien culture is communicating — but instead of using different wires and communications steams, they could be using different frequencies and technologies all at one time; just as we use several different data pipes to move our information around the world at the same time, even just in email.  We haven’t quite figured out how to map frequency spread communication past hydrogen-based frequencies, which is what we scan for the most often (programs like SETI, etc.)

Michio Kaku, my favorite theoretical physicist, likens this to an Ant, versus a superhighway.  “Imagine you’re an ant,” he says.  “You’re going about your business, doing what ants do…” and meanwhile, you have NO idea that other more complex creatures are building an eight-lane superhighway a few feet away from you.  Now, a few feet in ant-size is the equivalent of several MILES away from you.  However, one of these creatures, a human, approaches you.  He looks down at you and says “I bring you this superhighway.  I bring you the internet.  I bring you nuclear medicine.  Take me to your leader.”

Unfortunately, we have a problem here.  One, not only are you able to understand this human, but two, you have no CONCEPT of what any of this is.  Let’s assume this language barrier doesn’t exist — and that you are now the human, looking down at the ant, saying “I bring you all of this.”  How do you explain to an ANT the basics of a superhighway?  Much less, how do you explain the benefits of nuclear medicine, or the internet?  It’s mind isn’t able to understand these things.

Dr. Kaku states, which I believe, that at this point, we haven’t evolved to an understanding of how things at that level work yet.  Sure, the ants can see us, and may be aware of us… but if you were to walk up to an Ant, and say “Hello…” how could you two break that barrier — not only the language barrier, but communicate so that you both understand each other.

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May 25 2013

2700 Planets so far…

An artist's depiction of an extrasolar, Earthl...

An artist’s depiction of an extrasolar, Earthlike planet. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

NASA’s Kepler Observatory satellite has discovered over 2700 exoplanets so far…  and counting.  Most of these are super-earths — however, there’s a lot more there, according to the people who run it.

Ames Research Center scientists have the Observatory’s Photometer observes 145,000 Main Sequence stars simultaneously, looking for the slightest dimming of the stars that indicate an orbital body.  Of these, 114 have been actually confirmed and observed, one of them is a Mars-sized planet.

Ames also believes that, based on the observed planets, with the confirmations in mind, that the galaxy is full of Earth-sized planets.

Yale Astronomy Professor Debra Fisher, who has worked on improving the planet-detecting technology we have today to detect Earth-sized planets, says it’s only a matter of time before we detect life on other planets; specifically, those in the ‘habitable zone‘ of the stars they observe — that is, the area that’s “just right” in light and temperature, for life to flourish.

Do you think we’ll find alien life in our lifetime?

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Apr 20 2013

Higgs Boson: Mission Accomplished!

An example of simulated data modelled for the ...

An example of simulated data modelled for the CMS particle detector on the Large Hadron Collider.

It looks like the verdict is in: we’ve finally found the Higgs Boson — one of the most elusive particles; with the exception of Dark Matter, in nature.  Science has theorized of it’s existence for years, but it was always just beyond our grasp.

Today, we’ve finally confirmed the existence of what we believe is the Higgs Boson.  Last July, physicists and scientists from the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or known more properly by it’s French acronym CERN, announced that it’s Large Hadron Collider (or LHC) had conducted a particle acceleration test that revealed the presence of a subatomic particle that had the distinctiveness of what physicists postulated as the characteristics of the elusive particle.

Why is the Higgs so important?  So what?  In essence, the Higgs is, according to Gauge theory published in 1964, gives all conventional matter “mass.”  The average particle of matter contains mass, no matter how minuscule.  However, items of other types of matter, such as neutrinos which are able to pass right through solid matter without being interrupted, and the ever-elusive dark matter, seem not to have this subatomic particle in it’s makeup, according to the math.  Dr. Michio Kaku explains more here why the Higgs is so important.

With the numbers all working out, Science has finally [mathematically and now, via observation] proven the existence of the Higgs Boson.  How was such a feat accomplished, nearly 50 years after it’s postulation?

With the Large Hadron Collider, of course!  The largest particle accelerator on Earth, and in human history, the LHC is so large, it stretches through the border of France and Switzerland;

Large Hadron Collider

Large Hadron Collider (Photo credit: Randall Niles)

and remains one of the largest and most complex structures ever to be built by humankind.  Indeed, it’s literal atom-smashing power is in excess of 7 Tetra-electron volts (7 TeV) — or, to put it in some sort of perspective, a single visible photon of light is approximately 3.4 electron volts.  One Tetra-electron volt is 10E12, or ten to the twelfth electron volts.  Indeed, the atom-smashing power of this collider exceeded the previous most-powerful smasher by over seven times.  Some theorists postulated the idea that the LHC, at full power, had enough power to create a black hole if atoms were smashed at full intensity.  Luckily, this seems to have been proven wrong.

What has been proven right on the other hand, has effectively proven that we’re on the right track, and further, have taken another step toward understanding our universe.

What else is out there?  What more do we have to learn?  Plenty, I feel.

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Apr 19 2013

The Future of Technology — Licensure?

English: Apple director Steve Jobs shows iPhone

English: Apple director Steve Jobs shows iPhone (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Google recently announced (likely only for it’s developer-model) that if you receive a Google Glass  — it’s only for you.  Nobody else.  You can’t even loan it.

Indeed, the Terms of Service for it clearly state:

quote-open“…you may not resell, loan, transfer, or give your device to any other person. If you resell, loan, transfer, or give your device to any other person without Google’s authorization, Google reserves the right to deactivate the device, and neither you nor the unauthorized person using the device will be entitled to any refund, product support, or product warranty.”

While I assume that this is because it’s still a developing product, and it’s to keep people from making massive amounts of money by placing them on an auction site like eBay or something else; likely making a major profit.

It made me wonder if this, along with what Apple tried to do with the iPhone — is that you’re not buying the ITEM itself, you’re buying a LICENSE to USE the item, and the manufacturer maintains control and ownership.  Apple successfully did this until a lawsuit ended “part” of this, exactly how, I’m still not entirely sure how it works… but it does make one wonder:

Is the future of technology and hardware in licensure of USE, not OWNING the hardware itself? Will we be paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars simply for a right to use something we don’t even own? What does this say about our future privacy, as well?

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Apr 18 2013

Is Apple finally starting to feel the Post-Steve Era?

Steve Jobs while presenting the iPad in San Fr...

Steve Jobs while presenting the iPad in San Francisco 27th January 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today brought some bad news for Apple: iPhone sales on Verizon‘s network plunged 33% in the past quarter.  With the advent of the new iPhone 5, this is a shocking revelation that even *I* was’t expecting to see.

It brought me back to the journal entry a few weeks ago that I wrote regarding Apple’s future now that Steve Jobs is gone, and can’t come back this time.  The last time Apple found itself without Steve, it found itself having innovation problems, and found itself with an image it couldn’t shake — without welcoming Steve back.

Are smartphone companies like Samsung or HTC [seemingly?] out-innovating Apple?  To their own admission, Apple hasn’t had a benchmark product since the iPad (and to a lesser point, Siri); while products like the Samsung Galaxy S III and the Note II have shown what Smartphones can do when given drastically different dimensions, systems-on-a-chip and the proper innovation.

Where will the future go for Apple?  Will they be able to tread water while their next bench-breaker product is being developed?  Or is this the signal of something else for Apple — long term?

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Apr 15 2013

The hidden tricks and tips of NFC!

ImageOne little perk many newer cell phones in America come with is a feature that few know more than the name of.  It can do everything from allow the exchange of contact information, pictures and files, direct off-network communications and even allows you to unlock your doors at home, given the right equipment.   Called Near Field Communication, also known as NFC; this concept, while not entirely new, is beginning to find a presence in the United States.

ImageNFC is a set of communications protocols that operate similar to Radio Frequency Identification, most commonly known as RFID.  RFID is the system that commonly operates the “badge readers” for doors in offices, or those boxes that are attached to windshields to electronically debit tolls from your bank account or credit card.

Most RFID operates between 120kHz and 13.5MHz — fairly low-power, inexpensive and readily deployable with ease; and operate in close proximity to a power source, particularly if the tag that contains the information, authentication or some other information that is to be conveyed, is unpowered.

ImageNFC operates quite similarly.  In 2004, Nokia, Philips and Sony created the “Near Field Communications Forum,” a roundtable to discuss a form of communication that could be conducted wirelessly and at proximity, but also be very inexpensive.  Two years later, the Nokia 6131 debuted as the first phone with NFC technology, a reader that could detect and read small tags similar to RFID tags, on the device itself — which was able to communicate anything from showtimes from a “smart poster” to allowing an individual to make a purchase with his phone to charge his or her credit card or bank account.

Now gaining ground with American cell phones, popular uses for NFC have been included automation — for example, next to the door on the wall, inside the house, a person may place an NFC tag on the wall to instruct his phone to automatically connect to his home Wifi network, disable GPS and put volume and screen brightness to maximum — or to send an SMS message to someone else to say “I’m home!”

NFC chips can even be programmed for a “Capture the Flag” or a “Follow Me!” style game — where individuals scan tags placed innocuously, similar to a Geocache, that that others scan to check in, or find the next check-in point through a set of communicated instructions.

While NFC is still in its infancy in America, it’s already highly successful in East-Asia as a form of mobile payment and other forms of communications, particularly in conjunction with Wifi — it promises to expand the usability of the smartphone even more than it’s already become.

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